Date-Rape Site Taken Down

Share

Date-Rape Site Taken Down

A Web site advocating date rape was shut down Monday following complaints from outraged feminists.

Web hosting company MyInternet.com deactivated Daterape.org, which described itself as "a one-stop shop for all your date rape needs."

"It violated our terms of service policy which prohibits content which is of offensive nature or solicits criminal activity," said MyInternet.com spokesman Eric Woodward.

The site claimed to help men "get laid" by teaching them how to drug and rape women.

"DateRape.org vows to bring you the latest and greatest in date raping techniques," read the text on its home page.

The site also offered "DateRape in a Box" kits for $49.99, which include: "How-to Date Rape Properly Manual"; "Shut-the-Hell-Up-Bitch Duct Tape"; "Medical Prescription Guide" to check the side effects of certain drugs, and the DateRape.org "Quick and Easy Cookbook."

The registered owner of Daterape.org did not respond to repeated inquiries from Wired News.

While it is not clear whether the site was meant to be taken seriously, critics such as Feminist.com president Marianne Schnall were outraged by its tone and content.

"It's the most shocking and disgusting thing I have ever seen on the Internet," said Schnall, who contacted the Web hosting company and other feminists to express her disgust.

Schnall was particularly upset with the site's "Recipes" section, which included instructions on how to mix well-known date rape drugs like Rohypnol and Xanax into pina coladas and brownies.

"It's potentially dangerous," Schnall said. "Although the site only got about 500 hits, if even one person got the idea to go out and rape someone, it's terrible."

For feminists like Schnall, sites like Daterape.org go beyond the limits of free speech.

"If you want there to be free speech there's always going to be content that's shocking or demeaning," Schnall said. "But rape's a crime and so is drugging someone."

Still, both Schnall and MyInternet.com agree that deactivating a site is not a long-term solution.

"We don't control the domain name," Woodward said. "The person can just move to another provider and we can't stop that."

And while the site did violate MyInternet's policies by soliciting criminal behavior, "law enforcement may not be able to do anything until they can establish a link between an actual rape and the site," Schnall said.